Higher Infant Death Rates Accompany Voluntary C-Sections

If you’ve decided to have your next child via a voluntary c-section, you may want to reconsider. A study to be published in September indicates that infant and neonatal death rates during voluntary c-sections are higher than during vaginal births. Marian MacDorman as well as other researchers took a look at nearly 5.8 million live births and 12,000 infant deaths from 1998 to 2001 in order to determine the infant death risk associated with different types of birth, particularly the rates associated with voluntary c-sections compared to vaginal delivery.

In order to determine as true of a set of results as possible, the study only looked at pregnant women who had no complications with the delivery. This made the only difference between two different births the delivery method. By eliminating women with complications, the study will yield less tainted results.

The study is believed to be the first study to look at the death infant and neonatal death rate associated with voluntary c-section. Prior studies have been completed on risks associated with required c-sections; however, this study goes a step further to analyze those c-sections which are not mandatory and are instead, voluntary. The amount of births completed via c-section has rose from 20.7 percent in 1996 up to 29.1 percent in 2004, a staggering increase. This rise in c-section births has made the study more pertinent than ever.